by Nigel West
Parrott stated that Fels spoke very fluent English with a German-American accent. Mrs Parrott told the solicitor defending Karl Hentschel that Fels had spent July and August 1911 at the Prince of Wales Hotel in Chatham; that in August 1913 he was daily at Mrs Riley’s house in company with Nellie Riley and Mrs Pelling; that he was engaged to Nellie Riley, and that Pelling and Fels had been photographed together. His last reported visit to the Rileys took place in September 1913. When Hentschel returned to England, Fels spread rumours of his own death but shortly after resumed relations with the Rileys under the alias ‘A. Schulz’.
According to the interview of Atlantis (the alias adopted by Karl Hentschel) with William Melville on 15 October 1913, Hentschel came to England in 1908 – when there was some crisis on. He went to Devonport and was told to report anything he heard. He was there four months and sent in reports only on the movements of warships. He was sent to Sheerness in April 1909 to watch movements of ships, and mine-laying, etc. and he was asked:
I. To obtain a Naval Signal Code.
II. Questions about range-finding, the instruments used for this and for fire control.
III. The newest invention with regard to minesweeping.
IV. Exact position of lights inside and outside Sheerness Harbour. Whether any change during manoeuvres. To specify fixed and moving lights. The rules regulating the use of lights during night attacks.
V. The stations and duties of patrol-ships during manoeuvres.
VI. Where the submarine factory was. Whether cruisers or battle-ships carried submarines.
It should be noted that Frederick Gould afterwards declared that the Admiralty telegraphic code and the signal code had been delivered to the Germans in October and November 1911. In this he was not referring to his own achievements, but he must have been thinking of George Parrott’s. Gould had dropped communication with Steinhauer after receipt of a letter in September 1911 and he did not resume communication until the arrest of Heinrich Grosse in December 1911, which enabled him to bring pressure to bear on the Germans. Karl Hentschel was out of England from March 1911 until March 1912, and according to Parrott, the first thing that Fels asked of him was to procure the Naval Signal Book.
After Nellie and Edith Riley had been definitely offered employment by the Germans, the photograph of Captain Fels was circulated to the police at the dockyards, and at Queensborough, Folkestone, Dover and Harwich, in order that if he should come to this country, his movements should be reported to MO5. Some time later a group photograph was obtained of Captain Fels, the Pellings, Nellie and Edith Riley. From Parrott’s conversations with his fellow-prisoner Rayner it was ascertained that Fels had a postbox at the Aldgate Hotel, 76 Aldgate High Street in East London, and that he was an unscrupulous character who would stick at nothing; he had even drugged the Rileys in order to search their house. A HOW was taken out for Fels at the Aldgate Hotel, but had to be suspended owing to complaints of delay from the hotel. Enquiry showed that Fels was known at that hotel and at one time used to stay there frequently, but he had not been there for some time. He was supposed to be in the cigar trade.
In May Nellie Riley went to Brussels to meet Fels and she was shadowed by Fitzgerald who saw her meet a man resembling the description of Fels given by Karl Hentschel. Later the same person met Lina Heine in Ostend and in June it was arranged that £25 should be spent on finding out all that was possible concerning his movements and acquaintances. At this point, his story breaks off.
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John James Hattrick (alias Walter J. Devlin) of 41 Crymell Street, Stone House, Plymouth was born in the Wirrall, Cheshire in April 1888, and after seven and a half years’ service in the Royal Navy, he deserted from HMS Queen in June 1909; he was recovered but was not claimed for further service. He then obtained work as naval canteen assistant on board ships, but tired of the work. In March 1912 he wrote, using an illegible signature, to ‘The Head, Intelligence Department, War Office, Germany’ offering information and giving the wording of an advertisement to be placed in the Daily Mirror if his offer were accepted. The letter was stopped and William Melville, impersonating a German agent named ‘A. Pfeiffer’, inserted the advertisement giving the address 54 Shaftesbury Avenue.
Walter J. Devlin answered the advertisement from the Sailor’s Rest, Devonport and the correspondence continued for some weeks while Melville, cleverly imitating the style of a German agent, induced Devlin to show his hand and finally to drop all disguise and give his true name and address. At a meeting which took place at Devonport on 16 May 1912, Hattrick wrote out an engagement promising to find out and to forward any naval or military intelligence required by the Germans in return for a salary of £30 a year. The following day Hattrick, having taken Melville, whom he believed to be a German agent, into the dockyard, was there detained on a charge of attempting to communicate information to a foreign power. In reply he said his object had been to obtain money from the Germans and then go abroad. He was then photographed and released after being cautioned that the case was held in abeyance and that its revival depended on his good behaviour, that his photograph and description would be circulated to all dockyards, naval barracks, ships, and prohibited places and that, if found near them, he would be arrested as a suspect.
The fright cured him and when MO5 enquired about his conduct in August of the same year, and after the police had called at Cremyll Street, Hattrick wrote somewhat pathetically to implore them not to let his ‘only friend’ know of ‘that affair’. MO5 suggested telling him that provided his conduct remained sound nothing would be done to injure his prospects. Hattrick went into the Merchant Service and in September 1912 his discharge papers were marked: ‘Conduct very good’.
This is an interesting case of prevention at its very best and the affair never passed beyond these shores. The interests of the country were protected and in all probability a citizen was saved. The drawbacks, however, of the agent provocateur method were such as to restrict its application to the smallest possible number of cases. The handling of the case of Ernest Evans shows an ingenious variant of the method.
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Abraham Eisner, a tobacconist and stationer of 3 Edinburgh Road, Portsmouth was first brought to the notice of MO5 in connection with Charles Wagener. Observation revealed that Wagener had visited Eisner on 16, 21, 22, 23, 28 and 29 March 1912, always, with one exception between 11 and 12 p.m., an hour which suggests either great intimacy or unwarrantable business. The first visit took place on the day on which Wagener would have gone to Ostend, had the ticket and money been forthcoming; the last visit took place after Wagener had announced he would sell the ticket sent him for the meeting at Ostend on 31 March, after he had called at the shop of Levi Rosenthal. The abrupt cessation of intercourse with Eisner (Wagener was under observation till 10 April but no other visit was recorded) seems to betoken a quarrel. A quarrel actually did take place, though we do not know the date, and Wagener complained that Eisner had treated him, a fellow countryman, very badly. It is further to be remarked that no letters from Wagener to Germany were intercepted until after intercourse had ceased between the two men.
The Portsmouth police believed Eisner to be a German Jew and they viewed him with suspicion – on what grounds they did not state, but no doubt the dockyard police were in touch with the borough police and knew the talk of the town. Eisner’s character was not good. In business, he was a rogue and he had been twice prosecuted for selling indecent postcards in 1906. The charge was proved and he was fined; in 1911 it was dismissed. He told a neighbour that the postcards had been sent him from Germany by his father, Solomon Eisner, and in this connection it may be worth noting that a charge of having committed a similar offence was proved against Charles Wagener at North Shields in March 1914 and against Solomon Eisner in London in May 1914. During the war the existence of an obscurity code became known; whether picture-cards were ever used the writer is unable to say.
In May 1914 MO5 were made aware that Eisner was photographin
g warships. He afterwards stated he had obtained leave from Lord Charles Beresford.
Attention had been called in October 1913, to the undesirability of allowing the publication of picture cards of any portion of the naval and military defences and it was decided that the publication of that class of card must be stopped. The police at the ports were requested to watch for such cards and to warn the vendors that they might be prosecuted under the Official Secrets Act. It must have been in consequence of this action that the police at Portsmouth reported Eisner. As the papers have disappeared it is impossible to say how far MO5 prosecuted their investigation. The only reference to the episode is contained in a minute of 1915.
The facts as regards Eisner were suspicious. He had been running a very small tobacconist’s business, had been recently through the bankruptcy court, and yet was running a motor car worth £700. He told the police that he bought it out of the profits of his sales of photographs to naval men, but in June 1914 he told a neighbour that the money came from a legacy in Germany. He could not have pretended to make a profit of £700 in under a year or two, and the question arises whether he was engaged in that kind of business at the time of Wagener’s visits. If so then it is worth noting that Wagener was a silhouette-cutter by trade and that, according to Armgaard Graves, spies had to memorise the outlines of British warships from large charts of silhouettes.
Another source of profit came to light some years later owing to the indefatigable efforts of the intelligence officer at Portsmouth. It appears that in 1912 Abraham Eisner began touring the southern provinces as a traveller in watches and cheap jewellery of German make, and in that capacity visited various places in the Aldershot Command. Why, if his purpose was innocent, did he not mention this source of income (he did a good trade) to the police in 1914? This is only the first of many evasions, not to say lies, which do not seem ever to have been realised by those dealing with the case here.
In May 1914, Eisner sought to put himself right with the police by handing to them one of the spy letters disseminated in Portsmouth by Celso Rodriguez. There were so many of these letters that the action had no special merit.
At the outbreak of war, MO5 had in their files evidence of Wagener’s unseasonable visits to Eisner and of Eisner’s trade in photographs of warships; they knew that he was viewed with suspicion by the Portsmouth police, and that he had received a letter from Rodriguez. He had not, however, been placed on the SWL.
Early in August 1914, Eisner registered as a Russian subject born at Kalisz on 30 September 1884. He had come to England from Russia in 1896 and had married an Englishwoman in 1907. As he had no documentary evidence in support of his claim to Russian nationality, the military authorities decided that he and his wife must leave the district. This order was given verbally by the police on 28 August 1914 – two days before the promulgation of DRR 24A, which gave power to make the order. Eisner and his wife at once obeyed and as a consequence of Eisner’s efforts to get permission to return, the matter was brought to the notice of MO5 The lawyers employed by Eisner forwarded a certificate of Russian nationality obtained from the Russian consul-general, and an affidavit in which Solomon Eisner of 122 High Street, Whitechapel, supported all his son’s statements with the exception of the date of arrival in England. He stated that he brought the family to England in 1891 and that Abraham had gone to Portsmouth in the following year.
Enquiries instituted by MO5 showed that in his affidavit Solomon had suppressed a vital fact: the family had spent five years at Leipzig and one year at Antwerp on their way to England. Moreover he had antedated his arrival by ten years. Abraham Eisner, too, while admitting the facts about his photography at Portsmouth, and that he had visited Leipzig every year on business, lied about his visit in 1912, which he attributed to having spent his honeymoon there. He had married in 1907. These discrepancies and evasions passed unnoticed.
Enquiry of the Portsmouth police as to the facts of Eisner’s eviction produced a vague letter. Abraham’s statement that he had come from Russia, and the date and circumstances of his marriage were set forth, as also was the fact that his private home and business had been searched without result, and that he had been ordered to leave Portsmouth. MO5 assumed that their question had been tacitly answered and that Eisner had been expelled under DRR 24A. Accordingly, they referred the lawyers back to the Competent Military Authority and forwarded to them what seems to have been an undated copy of DRR 24A, but again no notice was taken of Abraham Eisner’s suppression and misstatement concerning his arrival here, which resulted clearly from a comparison of the reports of the Metropolitan and Portsmouth police.
The Officer Commanding the South Coast defences having refused permission for Eisner to return, the question of his naturalisation, which had been applied for in September 1914, was revived, but MO5 refused to recommend him. Next their attention was called to other members of the family. In August 1915 David, a brother of Abraham, was expelled from Plymouth, and in October of the same year Charles, another brother, travelling for the Beehive Watch Company of 125 High Street, Whitechapel, was seen at Southampton with an undesirable alien who had been expelled from that district.
Then Philip Halpern, travelling on behalf of David’s firm, the City Postcard Company of 40 Mansell Street, London, tried to get into important munitions districts in Lanarkshire; a month or two later the City Postcard Company was supplying cards with the forged stamp ‘Passed by Censor’ to a stationer at Folkestone. The method invariably followed by all the family was to submit gracefully to any protest or suggestion of the police and to begin again elsewhere. Then, acting on information received from the intelligence officer, Portsmouth, the intelligence officer at Aldershot wrote informing MI5 (G2) of Abraham Eisner’s transactions with jewellers in his district: the business seemed genuine and a good deal of money had passed hands, but the intelligence officer wanted to know more about Eisner.
MI5 left the decision as to whether Eisner should continue his travels in the Aldershot district to Major Gunn and sent a précis in which no mention was made of Eisner’s former connection with Charles Wagener.
Then Eisner applied as a Russian to be allowed to join the Labour Battalion and the intelligence officer at Portsmouth sent a précis of information he had collected tending to show that Eisner was not of Russian, but of German, nationality and that he had been connected with German agents. The neighbouring tradesmen had repeated scraps of Eisner and his wife’s talk from which it appeared that he was liable to military service in Germany, and he himself had said more than once that he was a German. On this point some of the evidence was eventually traced back to Wagener. The intelligence officer called attention to the discrepancy between the date of arrival in England as given by Abraham and Solomon, respectively, in official documents. The date on Abraham’s shop was 1902. The evidence as to Eisner’s connection with German agents had been taken mostly from MO5’s letters to the dockyard police, and thus, at length, MO5 became aware of this evidence contained against Eisner in their own files. To this the intelligence officer added other vague evidence: on leaving Portsmouth Eisner had entrusted the conduct of his business to his brother-in-law, M. Myers, and I. Zeffertt. Zeffertt had taken a hat to Mr Taylor to be ironed, and out of the lining there had dropped two letters from Berlin. These Taylor had handed to the police who had destroyed them before informing the military authorities and without making a copy or translation. Taylor also declared that he knew Eisner had employed a short hunchback during the period before his arrest and trial, and John Henry Pedler signed a statement to the effect that he had often seen William Klare with Eisner. Taylor was the manager of Dunn’s shop which was situated opposite Eisner’s business premises. He could, if asked, sign a statement, but he did not wish for publicity. Moreover, John Henry Pedler signed a statement to the effect that he had frequently seen Eisner with the hunchback during the period before the war.
In addition the intelligence officer stated that the order evicting Eisner had be
en made verbally and that in April 1917 Mrs Eisner had been allowed to return to Southsea, and her husband had been given leave to visit her once a month.
The question arose whether this man should be interned. It was decided to verify Wagener’s evidence against Eisner’s, but no steps were taken at Portsmouth, and no notice was taken of the strange action of the police. It was considered too late to intern Eisner and the intelligence officer was told that there was nothing in the information supplied upon which action could be taken at that time. Wagener’s evidence, when it came, was rejected as unsatisfactory. But Wagener’s declaration that Eisner had told him he was a native of Leipzig and Mills’ signed statement to the effect that Eisner had told him he was a German subject was passed over. Captain Coltart was accordingly informed that nothing had been proved by Wagener’s statement, but he insisted that further information might be obtained from Aldershot, so enquiry was pursued there and in London, where Eisner had registered on 30 March 1916. The police, in reporting, called attention to the suppression of material facts in this entry. He had registered as a traveller in watches and had given as his business address as 122 High Street in Whitechapel. Both the London police and the intelligence officer at Aldershot considered that Eisner’s business was genuine, and stated that he had been definitely rejected for military service.
MI5 now enquired to know the address at which Eisner actually resided. The reply came that he was seldom at has registered address and as much in Portsmouth as anywhere. Enclosed with this information was a notice from the Chief Constable that the military authority had cancelled the concession under which Eisner might visit that area once in three weeks. The list of the stamps recently inspected by the police in Eisner’s identity book recorded five visits during nine weeks, and the Metropolitan Police wished to prosecute for this irregularity and for incorrect registration. The intelligence officer at Portsmouth was informed and was asked for a copy of the original order against Eisner. He replied that none had ever been made; thirty-four people had been removed in 1914 and 1915 without any order except a verbal one, and they were kept out by the threat of applying for an order should they attempt to return. The appointment of an intelligence officer at Portsmouth dated from 1916 and Captain Coltart complained bitterly of the negligence of the police; he had compared the entries in Eisner’s identity book with those in the Register kept by the Portsmouth police and the results show that Eisner’s journeys were entered either in his identity book or in the Register, but never in both. Needless to say, the Register at Portsmouth showed no irregularity. Eisner told the police in London that he had received verbal permission to go to Portsmouth once a fortnight, but this was denied by Inspector Ford. The Chief Constable of Portsmouth wrote that on this question Inspector Ford had referred Eisner to the military authorities and sent documents to prove that from the outset the police had objected to making any concession at all.